This invention relates to an information processing terminal of the type detachably attached to an external computer system, such as a PC card and, particularly, to an information processing terminal having a housing of a form factor defined by PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association)/JEIDA (Japan Electronic Industry Development Association). More particularly, this invention relates to an information processing terminal of a foldable structure comprising a first housing of a form factor defined by PCMCIA/JEIDA and a second housing which is pivotally hinged relative to the first housing.
Various kinds of personal computers (PC) of a type including desk top, tower and notebook have been developed and brought into the market as a result of technological revolution in recent years. A PC is generally so designed as to permit a user to expand a peripheral environment.
Expansion of peripheral environment of a PC in the prior art has been done in many cases by mounting a desired "adapter card" into a "bus slot" provided in the PC. Examples of the adapter card include a video adapter, a communication (LAN) adapter and a SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) card, etc.
While mounting an adapter card is convenient and effective mainly in a desk top computer, it is not effective for a notebook computer which is not provided with many bus slots. In view of this, a "PC card" has been developed and brought into the market to augment the expandability of a notebook computer. A PC card is a kind of peripheral device designed in a size of a credit card (54.0 mm.times.85.6 mm). The expandability of notebook computers thus becomes easy by providing a card slot into which a PC card is inserted and electrically connected.
A housing of a cartridge type is adopted in the PC card, taking frequent attachment to and detachment from the PC into consideration. A guide line relating to the mechanical and electric specifications of PC cards are proposed mainly by PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association)/JEIDA (Japan Electronic Industry Development Association) and is a de facto standard. 3 kinds of PC cards are currently popular. They are Type-I of 3 mm thick, Type-II of 5.5 mm thick and Type-III of 10.5 mm thick. The Type-I is mainly used as a memory card. The Type-II is used for a facsimile/modem card, a LAN (token ring and Ethernet) card and a SCSI card while the Type-III is used as an integrated hard disk card.
Because a variety of line ups of PC cards has been recently available and the price has been lowered, a desk top computer as well as a notebook computer have been going to be provided with a PC card slot. The spread use of a PC card has been further encouraged since the US government declared in the summer of 1994 as a procurement criteria that every desk top computer should be equipped with a PC card slot.
As described in the above, it has been the general trend that the PC card is offered for use so as to be received in a card slot of a computer unit primarily for the purpose of augmenting the expandability of a notebook computer. However, the card has been polymorphic recently as the multi functionality of the PC card has been enhanced.
For instance, "IBM ChipCard TC-100", a PC card sold by IBM Japan, (hereinafter simply referred to as "TC-100") is a new type of a PC card which is provided with a self running function (see FIG. 6). TC-100 integrates therein an 8-bit CPU (SMC88112 made by Seiko Epson) for controlling the internal operation installed beside a PCMCIA interface and a memory (SRAM and EEPROM) and is provided with a keyboard (24 keys) as an input means as well as a liquid crystal display (72.times.24 dots, STN monochrome) as an output means on the top surface of the card. TC-100 functions as a conventional memory card while it is inserted into the card slot of a PC. On the other hand, when the card is removed from the card slot, the sleeping CPU wakes up so that TC-100 can activate its self running function. If certain data is downloaded into the memory within the card while the card is inserted into the card slot of the PC, the downloaded data can be displayed on the display of TC-100 when the card is detached from the PC. The downloaded data may include a PIM (Personal Information Manager) data edited on the PC (such as a calendar, a schedule and an address book) and a text data in a Web page which is obtained from a Web server, etc. TC-100 is of the size of a business card and has a very high portability so that a PIM data and a Web page may be seen even in a mobile environment.
"IBM ChipCard VW-200" PC card sold by IBM Japan (hereinafter simply referred to as "VW-200") employs a foldable structure comprising a first housing which conforms to the Type-II form factor of PCMCIA/JEIDA and a second housing which is pivotally hinged on one edge of the first housing (see FIG. 7). VW-200 is provided with a self running function similar to TC-100. Namely, it is used as a memory card when it is inserted into the card slot of the PC while it behaves as a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) under the control of the internal CPU when it is removed from the card slot. A PCMCIA connector is provided on the other edge of the first housing for electrical connection to the card slot of the PC. When VW-200 is unfolded, it can be inserted to the card slot as a Type-II card while it is inserted into the card slot as a Type-III card when it is folded. The majority of the top surface of the first housing is allocated to a key input area where the number of keys is more than TC-100 and the key top is larger allowing an easy input manipulation by a user. A relatively large liquid crystal display (STN monochrome) of 200.times.320 dots resolution is provided on the surface of the second housing to enhance the display capability over TC-100. A Kanji ROM is also integrated therein to support Kanji display function (16 dots font, double sized 12 characters.times.20 lines).
"DataScope-110", a PHS (Personal Handyphone System) telephone, which was developed by Kyocera jointly with IBM Japan (hereinafter simply refereed to as "DS-110", see FIG. 8) is provided with a PDA function beside a PHS function/wireless modem card function. The first housing of DS-110 conforms to the Type-II of PCMCIA/JEIDA and has a PCMCIA connector on one edge and a keyboard on the top surface. The second housing is hinged on the other end of the first housing. A relatively large liquid crystal display (STN monochrome) of 200.times.320 dots resolution is provided on the surface of the second housing. The PDA and PHS parts are each provided with an independent processor unit and memory (RAM and ROM) so that they can operate in parallel to perform a complex processing. The PDA part is provided with a flash memory (1MB), RAM (128KB) and a Kanji font ROM (2MB) in addition to a 16-bit CPU "TLCS-9001" made by Toshiba. The PHS part is provided with an antenna and an RF circuit for wireless communication and a wireless data processing circuit in addition to a data processing CPU and a memory. These components for wireless communication are each mounted within the second housing which is relatively thick and is not inserted into the card slot because of the size and a reception sensitivity. According to "PIAFS" (PHS Internet Access Forum Standard), a PHS public data communication service which is to start in April 1997, 32 Kbps data communication is supported so that an access from PHS to the Internet is feasible. For example, by installing a PIAFS compatible software in DS-110, an electronic mail may be exchanged even in a mobile environment. In addition, data received in the PHS part can be processed in the PDA part to display the process result on the display.